Mike North out as Web site executive

June 12, 2009

Amid allegations that Chicago Sports Webio has been bouncing checks in recent days, Spectrum Entertainment Chief Executive David Hernandez on Friday fired host Mike North as senior vice president of the sports talk Web site he helped found last year.

A simulcast of North's Comcast SportsNet Chicago program, "Monsters in the Morning," will continue to be heard on the Web site, according to North, who said late Friday he hopes to wrest back control of the Web site from Hernandez.

Efforts to reach Hernandez, whose NextStep Medical Staffing has been title sponsor of the "Monsters" television show, for comment were unsuccessful.

Other members of the launch team Hernandez fired Friday were North's wife, Bebe, as chief operating officer and Jeff Schwartz as general sales manager.

CSN Chicago's Web site, for a time Friday, did not list "Monsters" on its schedule for next week. But the program later returned to the listings, and a spokesman said he had no explanation for the temporary absence but the show would run as scheduled.

North said when he learned checks were bouncing, he, his wife and Schwartz unsuccessfully tried to reach Hernandez for an explanation.

"He wouldn't return our e-mails. We tried talking to him," North said. "Right now the plan is to figure out what's going on."

Hernandez has raised eyebrows with his considerable spending for the start-up.

Among the more notable expenses were paying for talent such as veteran host Chet Coppock and former boxer Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini and on a heavy marketing campaign.

He also invested heavily to outdo established media rivals in areas such as travel for staff to cover the Stanley Cup playoffs.

But a Crain's Chicago Business blog earlier this week quoted Hernandez as talking about expansion into broadcast radio and insisting the Web site already was making money.